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Leafs not upset to see NHL crackdown die

Rather than cut back on the need for enforcers – and a decline in fighting that would trickle down to the junior ranks – a team like the Maple Leafs is adding more muscle as it attempts to fight, literally, its way back into a playoff spot.

By PAUL HUNTERKEVIN MCGRANSPORTS REPORTERs

Fri., Sept. 25, 2009

While the Maple Leafs defend the NHL's failure to follow through on a planned crackdown on fighting this season – no surprise given their planned fists-of-fury tactics – the OHL is taking a wait-and-see approach, not passing judgment on the NHL's apparent escalating violence until it sees whether it's more than just a training-camp blip.

"It's a little premature to generalize that there's any particular trend here," said OHL commissioner David Branch yesterday.

"I'm not trying to defend the NHL because it's not my business, but I know that in most leagues, ours included, in pre-season you tend to have more fighting than you normally do."

After senior player Don Sanderson died as the result of hitting his head on the ice during a fight last season, Branch's junior league mandated that players keep their helmets on during any fisticuffs. It was generally perceived as an anti-fighting initiative – Branch said it was "solely" for player safety – and the OHL was lauded by some for taking the lead in removing gratuitous aggression from one of the NHL's main feeder systems.

The NHL's general managers also promised to crack down on staged fights (those that occur immediately after a faceoff) and more strictly enforce the instigator rule as a means to diminish fighting. But as the Star 's Damien Cox revealed yesterday, those ideas faced criticism when presented to the NHL Players' Association and never made it to the competition committee. Cox pointed out that exhibition games this fall have averaged two fights, with the Leafs averaging four fights per game.

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"Everybody agrees on the players' side that fighting is part of the game. That's where we stand," said Matt Stajan, the Leafs' NHLPA rep. "The whole staged fighting (issue), we don't believe it happens the way people think."

Rather than cut back on the need for enforcers – and a decline in fighting that would trickle down to the junior ranks – a team like Toronto is adding more muscle as it attempts to fight, literally, its way back into a playoff spot.

Rookie Jay Rosehill, for example, is about to earn a spot on the Leafs thanks to an ability to forcefully finish his checks and back up that aggression with his fists. So word that the NHL has abandoned a crackdown on "staged fights" is okay with him.

"There are times when a guy gets hit, and the right guy isn't on the ice, then you've got to go up to him at the faceoff, grab him, say this is what's going to happen, and from the outside that looks like a staged fight," said Rosehill. "Some guys go out in warmups and they're staging fights and say, `We're going to go tonight.'

"I can see how it looks silly from certain people's points of view, but there are guys who are trying to make teams, guys trying to keep jobs. But I look at it as you're out there trying to keep it clean, keep your teammates protected. That's what really matters."

After the OHL's helmet-on rule was put in place, Branch said fighting did trend slightly downwards but he said that may have been the natural change that occurs at the end of every season.

Mike Laing, president of the Ontario AAA senior league in which Sanderson played for the Whitby Dunlops, said he believes fighting has gone down in his league.

He said that was largely achieved through attacking the root causes of a fight, cheap shots like spearing, slew footing and head-checking, and increasing the suspensions for those infractions. The league also increased escalating suspensions for fighting and, as a safety issue, enforced the proper wearing of helmets and chinstraps.

"In my mind, the only way you can get rid of fighting is to get rid of the reasons for fighting, remove the cheap shots," he said.

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